Periphery

On a path laid as a snake,
Trodden down a winding wake,
Curls and slithers into night,
To thrones of ever-dimming light;
I hold still and gripped with feeling
In a mist that wraps concealing,
And I glimpse her flicker by
From the corner of my eye.
Heartless granite fissures break
At prayers to God of souls to take,
In their vessels bled to white,
Shells of failure and of blight;
It snares and snags as ivy veins,
Upon the brickwork, grasps and strains,
And I catch her ribbons fly
From the corner of my eye.
Set adrift in this domain,
The dead volcanoes that refrain,
Never smoking nor erupt
For the end was sharp, abrupt;
I feel the ether of despair
Envelope skin with frosted air,
I spot the crystals melt and die
From the corner of my eye.
No space for sorrow to explain,
To tell how love was savaged, slain,
The stir of breath can bare disrupt
Or wall of silence interrupt;
A fear of days, in truth, compare
With nights that always hunger there,
Unguarded moments, her I spy
From the corner of my eye.